Cal Poly puts all fraternities and sororities on probation

January 14, 2014

Cal Poly administrators placed all fraternities and sororities at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo on social probation Friday after the students and the administrators failed to come to agreement about off-campus party requirements.

Under the proposed agreement, parties would have to end by midnight, a guest list would need to be turned into the university 24 hours before an event and then a final attendee list due the following Monday. The lengthy proposed policy also prohibits drinking games and limits how much liquor a student could bring to a party.

Opponents of the proposal find it restrictive and cumbersome. Several Greek leaders believe that Cal Poly administrators are attempting to derail the Greek system at Cal Poly.

Negotiations over the proposed party registration policy are continuing this week. While under social probation, university sororities and fraternities are prohibited from hosting any events.

In 2010, a couple years after the alcohol poisoning death of Cal Poly freshman Carson Starkey, the university banned first-year student recruitment. Fraternity groups argued against the ban and administrators said they would drop it if the Greeks agreed to register off campus parties.

Forgive me for playing “The Professor of the Bleeding Obvious,” but this couldn’t POSSIBLY have anything to do with CalPoly’s bid to build a new mega-student-housing behemouth and the push-back by the future neighbors of such a high-impact development….

Long ago, I was once an immature student at another university. I understand that attaining legal adulthood doesn’t necessarily correspond with social maturity and that many students take time to become responsible adults. (I sure did!)

That said, tolerance by the community at large — and by the university — of the more extreme examples of disruptive and dangerous immaturity is not wise. Not only do students mature more slowly if the consequences of stupid behaviors are minimal (or non-existent) but said stupid behaviors too often cause major problems for others. CPSU is not be able to stop this entirely but they should disassociate themselves from it — and perhaps discourage it a bit in the process.

“Disruptive and dangerous immaturity” behaviors….who defines what that is?

Such a nebulous description leaves very wide interpretation in the hands of “authorities.” Even the definition of who decides what is objectionable is nebulous.

How about we treat CPSU students like other adults? If they do something illegal, such as causing a public disturbance, then call the police and let them handle it.

CPSU administrators are not trained to objectively discern who is doing something illegally, and what are the legal solutions to stopping the behavior of the individual/s involved in the activity. The police are. Of course, whether the police follow their training is another matter, but LEOs at least have the training to carry out the responsibilities of enforcing the law.

The CPSU administrators are trying to stop what they consider offensive behavior before it happens, and are leaving the description of the offensive behavior nebulous.

Why doesn’t the administration call the police if students are acting illegally? Good lord, we have enough laws. Surely they can find something to fit an existing law for their claims that the behavior needs to be stopped.

I’ll tell you why. It is because much of the behavior the administrators want to control isn’t illegal. It is, however, offensive enough to cause problems for CPSU’s obsession with building another behemouth student residence in a residential neighborhood.

That is what this deal is all about…students acting like students do when they party are a public-relations nightmare and, at the time of CPSU’s push to build new housing, that is something the CPSU administrators cannot allow.